How Finding Your Brothers-In-Arms Can Make You More Successful

“Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.”

-Ecclesiastes 4:12

Some time back, I was speaking to a buddy who has spent many years in the military. He has plenty of experience working in some of the world’s most volatile regions of the world under the most extreme circumstances. He said something to me that I will always remember.

“I’ve seen just about everything our military has available to it as far as human capability and I can tell you there is no such thing as a super soldier. It doesn’t exist. I can tell you, however, that there are super teams and that’s what wins on the battlefield.”

I’ve been part of many teams during the 16 years of training sport and tactical athletes, some of which were hugely successful and some that weren’t. And, as you can imagine, I’ve been around some very driven people who are committed to finding success in whatever endeavor they choose. Whether it is athletics, military, business, or community, we will always be part of teams, so it would behoove us all to learn how to better work in that environment.

In my own experience over the years, these are the ingredients that truly made winning, successful teams:

· Clear, concise, attainable vision, goals, and mission by all team members

· Good leadership

· Hard work and dedication to the mission

· Talented people

· Team members understanding their role

· Vision and mission of team decided on with integrity, character, and honor

I understand that this is not an exhaustive list but I do believe these points are some of the most important aspects to team success. With that said, I did leave out one extremely important aspect on purpose because I wanted to focus on it right now.

A successful team understands that what it is working toward is bigger and more important than any one individual in the group. The team members know they need each other in order to be as successful as possible. If we combine the aforementioned list with the last statement, you’ll have a team that is almost unstoppable.

And even if that team doesn’t achieve all the goals it set forth, I would argue that the work they do would still become something special.

In my conversations with other men, I hear their frustration at not being able to really open up to other men about the struggles and triumphs they encounter. It seems that many of us are pushing hard simply to get ahead of the other guy. We push, work, and manipulate things to put us above the heap and many times it doesn’t matter who we step on to get what we want.

We have forgotten the mission of helping others, forgotten that what we do is bigger and more important than us. We’ve forgotten what true success really looks like. As soon as we start believing that this is all for us, things become complicated, murky, and relationships become strained and break. This leads to a stressful environment and in-fighting, and any hope of moving forward becomes slowed and even stymied.

As I get older and wiser, I realize that having close friends and colleagues you can trust is more important than almost anything else when trying to accomplish a goal or work toward something special. Without total commitment to the cause – the mission, and a total belief in the man next to you, you will always hamper growth.

The men of Junto Tribe are seeking our brothers-in-arms. We’re working to align ourselves with men that invite us to be honest about our struggles. We want to build a team of men who value the mission of helping others.

I encourage you seek out those brothers-in-arms that you can stand next to. The ones who challenge you to bring about positive change. And secondly, be sure to be trustworthy yourself so that you too can be considered a brother-in-arms.

To my brothers-in-arms, and you know who you are, thank you. With you, we can achieve so much more. You can believe I will stand by your side no matter what.